- Actually impressive considering how heavy the box is.
I’ve just chosen this title thinking it was really clever and witty. The problem is that I know nothing about Star Trek and as a result, unqualified to make any metaphors that tie in to that situation where a follow up to an incredibly successful idea is given a huge amount of hype and no one knows if it will sink or swim. Hey look, I did it anyway. Good job unfiltered stream of consciousness. We fluked it, again.
This week is of course the first week of next generation gaming in the UK and the first time that I was in a position to experience it first hand in the comfort of my own house. I’ve had many consoles in the past but always a year or four after it’s been released due to interest levels in my brain or bank account. This time was different, I started saving as soon as the consoles were released. My normally empty spare account was filling up with untouched money to the point that the people in my bank would actually start smiling at me. Then last week I had to take out some of that money and walk nervously over to my local GAME shop to pre purchase. The agony of seeing my console and games scanned right in front of me and then put aside for the next night was almost too much to take. I left and tried to concentrate on other things like work, sleep and walking. All three things were affected until the next night.
- He better have paid for that.
I decided to go to the midnight launch of this console, only my second midnight launch after Modern Warfare 3 a couple of years before. I was prepared this time. I took my Vita, my Netbook and most importantly, a foldable camping chair. Due to my rapidly increasing age the thought of standing up for over two hours did its bit to dampen my excitement. After picking up my chair, my entertainment and as many layers that I could manage without looking like someone had decided to dye a snowman with beetroot juice, I set off to join the hopefully not too long line to settle in for two and a half hours of nervous waiting, fully expecting my excited jitters to mix with the shivering to keep me alive during the fast approaching English winter. I arrived and there were literally six people in the line. That number didn’t change till about 11:30 and I felt a little annoyed till I realised the person first in line had arrived at 16:30. In the end he had spent five and a half hours longer in line then me in order to pick up his console a whole three minutes before me.
If you haven’t experienced a midnight launch before I definitely recommend it. You are surrounded by people who have a tonne in common with you and you’ll find a little community of dedicated gamers who spend way more hours playing than you do. You’ll never run out of anything to say as long as you don’t start a Sony vs Microsoft debate. I mistakenly pulled out my Vita (Not a euphemism) during the last hour of waiting to keep my over excited but sleep deprived brain from shutting down, only to hear comments taking the piss out of my hand held games console that’s full to the brim with free games thanks to PS+. It’s a bit like taking the piss out of someone’s amazing and economical car that they got for free while you walk to work like a peasant.
So to my first impressions of the first gateway into this new generation of gaming. It’s brilliant. I don’t know whether I just have a very clear speaking voice, but the kinect works very well when I can remember the proper command to give it. It would be nice if it could just understand the short hand for games that I want to play but expecting it to know what Deadery Risingly threedidly dee means is asking a bit much. I picked up Dead Rising 3 and Killer instinct along with my free-for-Europeans copy of Fifa 14. I downloaded every possible app and demo that I could and I haven’t found anything to complain about.
- Look at how mean she is.
Actually I have. The fitness app is mean. It tells you off for not trying hard enough which is preferable to an actual person doing it but has the drawback of never forgetting the score that you posted on your first attempt with the camera positioned wrongly and before you’d put on appropriate exercise clothing.
Dead Rising is a tonne of fun due to its addictive collectibles-that-actually-improve-your-experience mechanic. Killer Instinct is everything I’d hoped it would be so far with a net code that may make me a believer in the cloud if it’s an example of how good online play can be.
Now I’ve just got to get my bag packed again for the other launch. Might take a hot water bottle this time.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
What they all look like before I made them look like men!
I have written about Grand Theft Auto a lot recently and I apologise to those of you that dislike the games. I have had an absolute blast however and I’m currently in that warm glowy space that you only find after spending over 100 hours roaming around huge open worlds completing 1000’s of missions and tasks. The finisher completer part of my personality is so sickeningly happy right now it’s friends have stopped hanging around with it as it’s getting too preachy.
All that to say that I really enjoyed GTA V. More than I was expecting to after grinding my way through its predecessor and it’s DLC’s and finding myself teetering on the edge of open world burnout . I do think that my recent time with the previous highest rated game ever gives me a distinct advantage in looking at how the series has evolved and where the beginning of that evolution started.
Red Dead Redemption in my eyes was the best game it could possibly be while still using a single character as it’s focus. The script, direction and tone of the cut scenes and interactions between characters were excellent and showed a massive leap in quality from GTA IV and it’s DLC’s.
So manly
It was in those DLC’s however that showed the beginning stages of where GTA V would head. Giving players three characters to spend time with, watch as their stories evolve and they take on challenges alone and as a group. How they interact and intertwine brings another layer to GTA V which the others lacked. The dialogue is the funniest it’s ever been, especially with Trevor with many moments that not only made me laugh, but also feel slightly guilty for laughing, which in my opinion is the best kind. The Graphics are amazing for the size of the world that you’re using. The cars look and sound individual which is another feat considering the amount on offer. You may get a repetition of cars while in traffic but really no more than you would get in real life. There may be a few more Ferraris than in real life but that’s because I life in the south west of England and not Los Angeles. I really don’t think there’s anything more I can say to persuade you to buy this game that you haven’t heard in dozens of other places already. Just buy it and experience one of the top ten games of this current generation of gaming.
Also very manly
Now the online section of the game which has been ripped apart by most people due to connection issues etc. I haven’t experienced any major problems at all during my time with it. I’ve logged on and played solo, joining missions with random players and not had any problems. I’ve played in a party with friends and we’ve connected to each others missions easily. Maybe my internet is really good. Maybe the amount of players in the UK is less. Either way I feel a little guilty getting the in game money as I didn’t experience any inconvenience. It’s not stopped me buying a sweet pad over looking Los Santos and a hyper fast electric super car to drive around as the sun sets in the desert towns to the north.
I’ve never played anything close to an MMO as I have a distinct dislike of anything fantasy or science fiction based which has really taken up almost the entire market up until now. I like my worlds to be more reality based and the fact that my friend and crew mate Luke could drive up next to me, beep his horn for me to get in his car for us to go off on an adventure was one of the best moments I’ve had in a video game for some reason.
The Heists are still not there which I actually think is sensible. If they’d given us the heists before the next gen consoles had released people would have completed them and never looked at their 360’s again. As soon as they are added I’ll be pulled from whatever console/game I’m playing to plan and execute a mission with my crew mates. At the moment there is still tonnes to do and I could see Rockstar expanding the world to allow for more expensive houses cities to freshen things every so often. As long as some of those updates include track packs I’ll be happy because I’ll soon become sick of the radio stations. Has there ever been a more first world problem than “The huge track list of licensed songs that I listen to when driving my digital car around a digital world is getting old”?
The Manliest
They also have to be working on a free to play GTA Online download for the next gen consoles. Charge us for hats and you’ll make money. The size of the game world would be huge and beautiful and everyone will play it and never need to play another game again.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Shame it tasted like Pepsi
You know what stops someone from writing about video games? Playing video games. The time I ended up putting into playing the single and multi player versions of GTA V threw me out of my rhythm enough that by the time I had moved into another house that the thought of writing again felt like I was starting from scratch. Not to say that I’ve not had many thoughts about the tension building every day in the lead up to the next gen console releases or my attitude towards the consoles as the first reviews were published or whether the first editions of the console and it’s games really matter.
While my writing may have slowed, my habit of reading every possible story has increased ten fold. Watching the fanboyism grow to ridiculous levels. The line between troll and actual commenter has all but disappeared as any news both positive and negative is met with absolute hate from the rival group. There was a story last week in which Microsoft tweeted a congratulatory message to Sony on the launch of their system. It was worded in such a way that no insult could be meant, however people still accused Microsoft of playing dirty or doing something wrong. They couldn’t work out WHAT they had done wrong, but they had done something. It is really getting depressing now as people decide who will win the next console war basing their decision on nothing. Some will claim that they’ve played all of the systems and games and are completely unbiased. I don’t doubt that some lucky relatives of engineers and devs will have played some of the games. The fact that dozens have appeared in countless message boards makes me a little suspicious.
The reaction as PS4 reviews started to appear showed just how bad it was getting. The high pitch gleeful noise you could hear was Xbox fans everywhere screaming with joy as Knack reviews showed that it was not a leap forward. It was just ok and the same was true with Killzone. PS4 fans jumped to the defense of their system while promising that the Xbone reviews would be worse and that the PS4 will still triumph due to reasons.
I can’t pretend that the cancellations of various games and the reviews of the launch line up didn’t diminish my excitement for the PS4. At one point I almost canceled my pre order before slapping myself with the truth that not only will I miss out on the chance to experience this new generation first hand, but I’ll also be able to criticize both systems equally. Also PS+ is starting up straight away with the PS4 so every month I’ll be able to download new games on every internet enabled Sony machine for no extra cost.
If Kristen Bell really was the model of an obsessive then people would be ok with it
I’m buying both systems at launch and at no point have I thought that any launch games will be outstanding. I’m willing to predict that we won’t see a masterpiece on either system for over a year. I’m excited for Titanfall but I’m not convinced. The 360 and PS3 have only just hit their stride. The last year has seen an amazing range of high scores. We might not see games as good for five years or so.
The biggest indicator of this for me is that in this crazy week in which we’ve seen dozens of games released, The two highest rated games have been for the Wii U and the Vita. Currently the two consoles that are the easiest targets for abuse. Obviously once I get my hands on both machines and spend some time with them I might change my mind and pledge allegiance to the Bots or Ponies.
Small side note. X-Bot is a really cool nickname that it supposed to be insulting. Sony Pony is slightly worse but not by much. I’m seriously considering getting a tattoo artist to come up with a picture of a giant mutant horse in Sony colours fighting a giant Microsoft branded robot to represent the duality of my console preferences.
So this is me starting up again. Join me next time for more potential tattoo ideas that my wife would hate and the occasional opinion on video games.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
While the reviews for GTA V have been almost universal in their praise despite some moral differences. Not one review will say anything negative about the music available as you ride around Los Santos. There is a good reason for this, It’s fantastic. All of the GTA games have kept people amused as they drive around for hours on end with music as diverse at Reggae and Hard Core to Country and Pop. I’ve been fan of using other people’s poetry to convey emotion ever since I first watched Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. There are obviously dozens of films, TV Shows and video games that create their own score to great effect and this may be the more impressive option as you have to create something from scratch to add emphasis to your product.
However there have been few better moments in cinema than the scene in which Mr Yellow stalks the police officer while Stealers Wheel’s “Stuck in the Middle with you” plays in the background. Reservoir Dogs like all of Quentin Tarantino’s films uses licensed music perfectly by portraying the tone of a film or scene while helping the viewer instantly connect with a situation they would never find themselves in. Feeling familiar, even comfortable within a scene in which a man has his ear cut off can make the audiences emotions run over and stay with them for years.
Grand Theft Auto creates those situations in spades as you run from the police listening to Iron Maiden’s “Run to the Hills”, completing a mission only to hear Stevie Nicks “Edge of seventeen” or heading towards making a big decision in game and “The seeker” by the Who stops you from leaving your car until it’s done.
It gives you goosebumps as you’re playing and it’s those feelings that make you come back to a game when the story and challenges are complete. While playing GTA V for the first time I found myself wanting to just go for a drive while listening to the radio. I found myself a fast car, got onto the motorway/freeway and just kept on driving. The visuals will never look as impressive as on that first drive as the sun set and rose again revealing the varied countryside and mountain ranges. Then “Only girl (In the world)” by Rihanna came on the radio followed by “Baker Street” by Gerry Raferty and “Party all the time” by Eddie Murphy and it changes from being fun to an actual experience. I would gain nothing in game for driving around for an hour but I came away feeling happier and calmer than before.
One of the trends I’ve noticed in GTA IV and V is Rockstar’s tendency to choose original versions of popular songs for their radio stations. Whether this is done on purpose or not I have no idea but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone at Rockstar wants us to hear where our music originates.
So far I’ve heard
“Stratus” by Billy Cobham. The bass, guitar and drum were sampled in Massive Attacks “Safe from harm
Stevie Nick’s “Edge of seventeen” lends the guitar riff to Destiny’s Child’s Bootylicious
“Ready or not Here I come” by the Delfonics inspired The Fugees “Ready or Not”
There are many, many more and I may just be making connections where there are none. I hope I’m right though as I think that we can all learn more about the people that inspired the music we enjoy.
Video games can be the perfect way to discover more music due to the interactivity. Guitar Hero opened me up to dozens of songs and bands when their yearly releases dropped. It’s only when you pretend to play along to crazy guitar solos on fake plastic guitars and fail that you appreciate how much talent is contained within those four minutes or so. If a drive around a digital world in a fake car can cause the type of emotions you get in the real world then Rockstar must be doing something right.
So what songs have you discovered in GTA V so far. Are there any other connections you can see in the music used. Let me know below.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave.
GTA IV is a story about outcasts About people that don’t belong in their world but struggle to make the absolute best of the situation they’ve found themselves in. I was fairly critical of Niko in my last blog about GTA IV, saying that he felt flat in comparison to the characters around him. He plays the straight man and I assume that is due to Rockstar wanting us to connect with him to allow us to make those few moral decisions that pop up during the game. I didn’t connect with Niko, I always play through games leaning on the good guy side if given the choice. I’ll let people live, I’ll put them out of their misery, I’ll save the little sisters. The problem that I had with GTA IV is that the few moral choices that you’re given seem to have no bearing on the story and didn’t fit the character that was shown in the cut scenes. Choosing to not kill a drug kingpin when you’ve just murdered a dozen of his henchmen who are just doing the job that they’re being paid for. Why should you spare the man responsible for the spread of drug addiction, disease and poverty? There is also no risk/reward for your choices making them almost worthless. It doesn’t even make you, as a player feel better about yourself seeing as all the game needs to do is ask and you’ll help in the kidnapping of a young woman and slap her about for no other reason than who her father is.
There is one choice in the game that seems to make a small difference and does show character growth. This did let me finish the game with better feeling towards Niko and the story improves dramatically in the final third. I do wish that Rockstar left the other missions that didn’t lend themselves to the story that Niko is redeemed by the end of our time with him. Especially as after the game you can just wander the map murdering everyone in sight.
Straight away I moved onto The Lost and Damned expansion which introduces the Motorcycle Club of the same name and Johnny their temporary leader. I’m a massive Sons of Anarchy fan so the chance to play as a biker gang immediately appealed to me. The bikes handle like a dream which was a worry having just played GTA IV. There are improvements to the guns as well as the bikes, Bike delivery and gun delivery works perfectly and browsing through the gun van really fits the outlaw vibe. Obviously it’s a much shorter story than the main game but it will still take you at least eight hours to just complete the story, which I loved. Watching a once tight MC disintegrate after the return of their president after a stay in prison is difficult to watch at times. Factions formed between members who are pushing for sustainability and peace or anarchy. Jibes are thrown at the gang by characters you meet for being behind the times. Past their prime during the 60’s before modern gangs turned to drugs and more modern means to survive. Turning their illegal behavior into a business rather than a reason to get drunk and stoned. I may be looking into it too much if I was to say that it’s a coming of age story. A tale about a group of friends, separated for one reason or another, brought back together to only find that things have changed and the old days can’t be replicated. I really enjoyed TLAD. I seem to be in the minority here.
The Ballad of Gay Tony ramps up the crazy in Liberty City by tasking the player with causing massive explosions and winning huge races from the get go. The missions are bizarre and feel completely different from the other two stories. They are a lot of fun and you’ll love them even more if you enjoy using the helicopters to blow stuff up despite it being incredibly hard to aim or control or do anything with any fines with. I do not like the helicopters. The story is the weakest of the three in my opinion but that minus is helped with the boost in flat out fun
Watching another side of a few of Niko’s missions was a lot of fun and really plays to my love of interesting story telling and seeing characters given cameos in the main game fleshed out in further stories is a joy. It was also satisfying actually seeing where the diamonds ended up after playing through almost two dozen missions where they are the focus.
This trilogy of stories charting these outcasts needs to be played as a whole in order to get what GTA IV was about. An immigrant, a loner among friends and an odd couple. All with big plans of how to make it in the modern world while all being stuck in their past. Each has its own focus but to really see how good of a game GTA IV is they should be played as a whole. I wouldn’t completely agree with those that have made this the highest rated game of the generation. There are others that have gripped me with their stories or game mechanics more. I will say that as a whole package, I don’t think another game I’ve played can match the scope of this story and the amount of characters you can interact with.
Now considering I’ve left my copy of GTA V with its cellophane on since day of release so that I could finish its predecessor, I’m off to install and play and hope that it doesn’t crash my aging Xbox.
Not this type of crash.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
There was a time when I didn’t play many online games. I played mostly single player games and was perfectly happy with my lot. I then picked up Street fighter IV and got a taste of online match making and felt that hit that only competition (and drugs I presume) can give. That was shortly after I bought my XBOX 360 so playing online was very new and exciting considering I’d always been scared of attempting it on my PC. I would spend some evenings playing match after match, looking to improve my record and skills against those who cared a lot more about frame advantages and were able to focus cancels on a regular basis. The addiction hadn’t kicked in yet and I was still making room for new games as they released. A couple of years later Bioshock 2 was released and during my quest to complete all of the achievements I was tasked reaching level 40. This forced me to play hours and hours of the multiplayer but as soon as I had done so I pushed the game aside. It was fun but not all encompassing.
His beard makes him the best character
The Halo Reach beta was my first taste of competitive FPS action. My friends and I jumped in and played it a bunch during the beta and once it released proper. I could feel the urge building to play more and it forced me to buy Black ops a little over a month later. Like an addict finding the last drug they’ll take for the rest of their life, I started using every available moment to play this fast paced and rewarding shooter. The defining moment happened shortly afterwards. I managed to get my first Blackbird, Chopper Dogs kill streaks. I actually had some skill and a pretty decent record. My wins started to stack up and my progression through the prestige’s were picking up speed which was giving me the sense of competition and accomplishment I craved while robbing me of the time and inclination to play some of the best games ever made.
I didn’t care that Mass Effect was getting game of the year awards and Mass Effect 2 and 3 were continuing that amazing story. Dead Space was ignored even though it brought about resurgence in tense horror action games that I craved so much. Even God of War 3 (which is currently sat in my pile of shame) was pushed aside so that I could concentrate on fighting with others in a cold war inspired war zone.
Don’t get me wrong, at the time I LOVED the time I spent online playing both Halo and Black ops. Both games are crafted incredibly well and give you the sense of constant improvement and validation that most people yearn for. The competitive element is also incredibly strong. Seeing the gamer tags of the players you fell while hearing people shout into their microphones as you mow them down with your chopper gunner streak. I would take great pride in every message I received on XBL from players assuming that I was cheating because I was beating them so badly. People like to hate on the COD series in any post you ever see written about the game, some of the criticism is completely valid. However anyone that says that the Call of Duty series produces bad games is deluded. They are very well made games that have produced competitive tournaments. They are mostly balanced and do a good job of fixing games after release to cut down on people exploiting the engine to win. Each studio makes a game every two years and it fills that competitive need that many players yearn for but don’t receive in other places. If you think that COD games are examples of bad game making then you haven’t played any bad games.
What I do find depressing about this situation however is that often you’d look at other peoples scorecards and profiles and notice a worrying trend. Each person would have between 200-2000 gamer score. I’d check their achievement list and notice that they had ONLY played Call of Duty games. They wouldn’t even play through the whole of the COD campaign in each game. If you’ve paid attention to the blog then you’ll realize how crazy I find this trend considering the amount of content available on just the COD disc. I’m not saying that Call of Duty is the best example of game making, but ignoring the campaign and spec ops/zombies completely seems insulting to the programmers. On top of that is the larger problem that thousands of gamers are only playing one type of game instead of experiencing the story telling, atmosphere and characters of other games. The countless gamers that you see on message boards online who seem to have absolutely no idea how to speak to other human beings suddenly make more sense.
The medium that we enjoy so much offers a brilliant way of experiencing problems and how to overcome them without being put into that situation themselves. I liken it to those people you went to school with who played sports and did nothing else. The emotional development that comes with reading, watching or playing a story about hypothetical situations that we can relate to is incredibly important to who we become. If all you’re doing is experiencing competition with others through COD when you could be experiencing the wonder of exploration and interpretation in Journey, The story structure and intrigue of Bioshock or the heart break of separation in The Walking dead, then you are missing out on emotions that could change you into a better, more well rounded person.
Along the same line of thinking Call of Duty is stopping players from experiencing other games from other companies. I would bet that there are players out there spending money on XBL, their yearly COD game and the map packs that are released and that’s it. They could easily get a years entertainment from that and be happy, yet they are not contributing to video games improving as a genre apart from the small changes that we see in COD per year.
Whether Activision have tried to purposely starve other games companies of funds through addictive game play, winning the yearly sales figures even though they could be hurting their other releases at the same time, or it’s just a happy coincidence. I do think that gamers stuck in the online loop need to take a break and experience something different from time to time at least. Support the industry that you apparently love so much. Play a lesser known indie game, test your puzzle solving skills as well as your fast twitch muscles. Look at the other sides of this diamond of a medium and you might see the different sides of yourself looking back at you.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Ouya Urbandave
“I may have left this too late” I said to myself as I booted up Grand Theft Auto IV a little over a week ago. The last two games I’ve been playing serving as a distraction from the commitment that I knew I had to take care of. Like a debt that had been built up over a few years sitting in the back of your mind. Always there, always present in every decision that you make, knowing that at some point in the future you’re going to have to face it.
GTA IV had become the video game version of that debt. Sitting on my shelf, taunting me with its game play lasting dozens of hours and . Not only that, I had bought the complete version containing the DLC campaigns as well and the task was crippling in its enormity. I’d bought GTA IV during the Christmas of 2010 with some money I’d been given, fresh from playing through Red Dead Redemption and still basking in the glow John Marston’s story had produced in me. Red Dead had surprised me. I actively dislike westerns and was uninterested in other GTA games released since its first move into 3D. I can’t remember why I played Red Dead considering the road blocks created by my psyche but the story hit me incredibly hard and the fun to be had from just hunting and riding around the beautifully rendered countryside kept me on its leash for a long time. 
Your words are useless at times during Red Dead
With all of that in mind I picked up GTA IV with a sense that Rockstar had moved on and I was going to experience a deep story line set in a contemporary American setting. I was let down quickly and painfully. The controls felt so bad in comparison to Red Dead that I felt put out straight away, The story didn’t have any effect on me and I gave up after about 3 hours. I moved on and haven’t gone near it since February 2011, until now.
I put the disk back in and picked up where I left off and the game felt better some how. Maybe the gap between Red Dead (and LA Noire to some extent) had grown enough for me to not compare how the games played? 
Has everyone forgotten about this game?
Maybe I had let my standards slide? Maybe I had let the hype for GTA V smash through my hesitance so that I could at least play some kind of GTA before the 17/09/13. Whatever it was I’m glad that I did. It really is an enjoyable game and the amount of content that is contained within it is staggering. The missions just keep coming and that’s before the side missions and content are touched. I have to just play through the missions in an attempt to finish the campaign and it’s still surprising me with new features, guns and vehicles 16 ish hours into the game.
The story does not feel as accomplished as other Rockstar games but I don’t think they found their feet until Red Dead came along. Nikko feels empty as the focus of the game surrounded by such an animated and interesting supporting cast. I haven’t finished the campaign yet so my attitude may change. If it doesn’t I’m not going to cry about it as the game is still a lot of fun. I don’t find the anarchic, kill and smash everything until you can’t kill anymore, way of playing to be fun. I need structure around my fun and the missions are full of racing, shooting and robbing joy. If that continues until Nikko’s story concludes I’ll still be very happy I picked this game up again.
I also realize how crazy it is to write about GTA IV the day that GTA V is released. I do find it useful to look back during these huge game releases. What are the pitfalls these franchises have stumbled into in the past? Did GTA IV change the landscape of gaming as much as we thought it did? Will anyone pick up this game again now that GTA V is out? I have bought my copy of GTA V and I can’t wait to start it, but I really feel that it will look archaic once I boot up this years version. So back I go with my nose to the grind stone to complete this wonderfully made, brutal yet beautiful and touching at times game that will soon be completely ignored in favor of its even newer, even more wonderfully made, brutal yet beautiful and touching at times game.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Ouya Urbandave
Sometimes your brain doesn’t want to start something big. Maybe work or life has brought about stresses that are occupying more of your brain then you can afford and taking up the remaining space with plots, character personalities and new ways to play a game is down right irresponsible.
This is why I decided to play through Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon and it may be one of the best decisions that I’ve made when it comes to playing games.
I was born in 1982. Maybe too young to watch all the 80’s action films when they came out but I spent a good amount of time catching up once I saw Rocky, Predator and RoboCop etc. If you haven’t watched any 80’s films then you will be missing out on a large part of the humor and charm within Blood Dragon. In particular the three series I mention above should be required viewing before starting this game. You will thank me later for recommending some quality fist pumping celluloid action as well as turning Blood Dragon into a much bigger experience.
If I can change and you can change……
I haven’t played Far Cry 3 as yet due to time and brain constraints so when I heard about a smaller and shorter Far Cry game coming out (Once it had been confirmed that it wasn’t an April fools hoax.) I became very interested. I watched all the reviews which gave it a very good average score and once the time came I new I was going to jump in. The time came and I jumped in with both feet all the way up to my neck.
Aside from it containing the best tutorial of all time, the opening is perfect. I wasn’t ready for the different skills available from the start having not played a far cry game but that quickly made way for smooth, confident game play. You feel very powerful as Rex Power Colt from the get go but not too powerful. There are places in which you can stumble and the game brings you down to earth, forcing you to use cover, stealth and even your brain to progress.
You also use your biceps. A lot.
The guns work sharply and the cross bow you pick up is so satisfying to use that I tried to use it in all situations, rightly or wrongly. The world design is clever. Initially you’ll think everything looks very similar, the 80’s neon against dark back ground filling your vision. In no time you’ll be able to recognise where you are on the map from the scenery and animals. You’ll spend the majority of the game liberating strong holds from your enemies. From this you are given extra missions which I found myself rushing out to complete so that I could pick up the next upgrade for my guns. The collectibles add another addictive element to the game and are handled perfectly. Once you take control of a strong hold you’ll be able to buy discs containing the locations of the collectibles which makes them worth while. You have no idea how many games with collectable trophies have put me off after asking me to find 200 items with no help at all. It’s busy work of the worst kind.
Blood Dragon dislikes your shitty collectibles.
The gains you make from spending countless hours searching rarely make it worth while. Blood Dragon is an example of this handled brilliantly.
The thing that makes Blood Dragon an almost perfect game however is the length. You can finish this at a leisurely pace in 10 hours. When I say finish, I mean 100% complete it. Collectibles and Achievements all completely done.
All the work in the world won’t save Canada though.
It’s so satisfying knowing that it’s reachable from the start. There are no missable achievements from memory but I do suggest that you kill as many Dragons during the story mode as once you’re in free roam mode they are not found as often. You could say that this doesn’t have a huge amount of re playability and I wouldn’t argue. However there are only a few games that I would go back to once I’ve completed them so this isn’t a big deal for me. It costs £10 ish so in my eyes it’s great value. I’m going to look back on Blood Dragon with very positive thoughts and recommend it to everyone I know. You should do the same.
Also once you get to the line “This is so much fun………and sad.” let me know. It’s much funnier once you know the context.
P.S You should also watch Road house. It’s the worst/best film you will ever see.
“You’re such an asshole”
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Ouya Urbandave
I’ve been playing tower defense games ever since a co-worker told me about this flash game he’d found on the net. The scene when I look back over it reminds me of the seediest of drug deals that you see in films. A shady character with a product that is so good that he’s taken to passing it on to his friends, knowing full well the depths that their friends will sink to once they have a taste. The game was desktop tower defense. It was so addictive that I probably lost days at a time trying to complete this game as I made small progress with each try. I later found out, after searching through youtube for tip videos, that the game was impossible to beat. As soon as I found that out my interest disappeared thankfully and I was able to cast aside this addiction and get back to work.
I’m getting cold sweats just looking at this.
My interest in this genre persisted though. A flash game here and there but it wasn’t until I downloaded geoDefense on my phone that I felt the addiction creep back in. This game was everything I wanted in a tower defense game. Balanced game play and a huge sense of satisfaction with every completed level due to it’s harsh difficulty spikes. It looked amazing and the achievements were achievable so I’ll always look back fondly on it and its sequel geoDefense Swarm. I think you can pick it up on all phones so if you have a spare month to give up of your life in search of a gold star in each level, buy it now.
It’s sooooooooo Shiny!
Since then I’ve only played plants vs zombies which doesn’t really count. So when Defense Grid: The Awakening came up as a free game to download through XBL I jumped at the chance. Firstly the game looks amazing. It’s an old XBL game from 2009 and the level of detail is massive for a game that could feasibly have dozens of characters on screen at the same time. I didn’t experience any slow down in my run even during some of the more hectic levels. The best thing about the game is how difficult yet achievable it is. You can blast through each level and not care about your ranking and score fairly easily. If you want to perfect each level then it could take hours per level and that might not even result in a gold medal. Nothing is handed to you at all. You have to earn your wins and I love that about it. The story won’t grip you despite some excellent voice work by Jim Ward lends some humanity to the story (Even though he’s playing a robot.). It’s serviceable and helps move from level to level, but really, it’s not needed. Tower Defense games are about the puzzle and the balance which Defense Grid does excellently.
The detail when you zoom in is incredible.
It also has the ability to open up a time portal and make hours disappear. You will convince yourself to have one more go and you will do it often. Thankfully my wife understands when I get into bed at 1am due to a game getting into my head but if you don’t have hours and hours and hours at a time to commit then you may not get as much out of this game as you should.
For me it’s perfect after a hard day at work. Put on some music really loud and start blowing up dozens and dozens of Aliens. It’s so satisfying in the best way possible.
Many people laughed at Defense Grid when it was announced as the first free with gold game. After playing through the game I can’t praise it enough. It you haven’t given it a chance yet but downloaded it as it was free, play it now so that it’s done by the 22-11-13.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Ouya Urbandave
In the early days of this blog I wrote about the PS2 and the feelings running through me knowing that the system was ceasing production. I talked about how I loved the system and played many a game that I loved on it. That was only half true. The PS2 is part of the reason that I stopped playing games for a long time and the main reason why I felt so disconnected from the gaming world.
There are many games and genres of games that I don’t gel with at all and the PS2 was full of them. Now this is going to piss off a lot of you. But there are games deemed classics by their critical and commercial success and they either don’t interest me or I’ve tried to play them and they’ve annoyed me so much that I’ve given up.
This has all come about because I tried to start my next incomplete game for my XBOX 360 last night and I was met with two flashing red lights. Two flashing red lights thankfully, not the dreaded Red Ring of Death. This apparently means my XBOX is over heating. While it is hot in the UK at the moment, it’s not that hot. Most likely my 360 is caked in dust which is over heating the processor and not allowing air to travel through. 
It looked very much like this. But dustier.
While I was trying to find fixes on the internet (I might make a video of what I find inside the XBOX once I crack it open.) I decided to just try and finish a game on my PS3. One of which was Shadow of the Colossus HD remake that was available through PS+. I missed this on the PS2 the first time around and loved the idea. Roaming around a huge world looking for giant monsters to battle. No levels, just boss battles that you shouldn’t win. My brain was telling me that as a gamer, I should play this game and complete it so I can talk about it with conviction and gravitas in the high brow conversations I’ll have about games in the future while drinking fine wine and eating roasted meats. This would sit alongside my opinions that Bioshock creates an atmosphere unmatched in any other game. That tower defense games are the most comforting type of game ever created. Finally, that paying for a yearly update to a fighting game such as Street fighter 4 is perfectly reasonable considering you can then play that game for hundreds of hours afterwards. 
My dinner guests would laugh and nod with what I had said. I would then lead onto my recent play through of the classic Shadow of the Colossus.
Unfortunately I would then tell them about how the mechanics of the game frustrated me so much that after about an hour of trying to slay the first colossus, I was ready to snap my controller in two. So I stopped. I had downloaded it through PS+ so I didn’t feel like I had lost out. It did lead me to look over my relationship with the PS2 generation of games.
I wasn’t quite this close to the screen. Or wearing girls clothes.
There has not been a generation that I didn’t gel with more. I think the problem comes from two things. Video game consoles were between 16-25 year olds when the PS2 came out. I was also 16-25 when the PS2 was out. Two entities finding their place in the world. What are the extremes of their character? What will be their successes and failures? How will they change themselves and what things will stick?
Video games were moving through their late teens and early 20’s at the same time as me and we didn’t gel all the time. There were exceptions. The Warriors is probably the best licence conversion outside of comic books to ever be released. 
Metal gear solid 2 and 3 were amazing as I’ve mentioned before. I even enjoyed the various wrestling games that the WWE released on the platform. Many more however didn’t inspire me. I still think GTA 3 is over rated. 
I would enjoy crashing and blowing stuff up but I never felt the need to complete the game. It was full of conversions of PC games that didn’t work anywhere near as well and in general I found games to feel awkward and unfinished. Much like a 16-25 year old.
However without these games that I found frustrating we would not have the ground breaking stories and game mechanics and graphics that we enjoy today. It does however show that a HD lick of paint is not enough to change someone’s mind about a franchise. I really wish I could talk to my dinner guests about how Shadow of the Colossus is a triumph of gaming creativity. However, to me it’s a spotty teen trying too hard to be cool and gives some people that impression when in actual fact he’s just difficult to be around not worth the time.
XBL, PSN and Twitter @Urbundave
Ouya and IGN Urbandave
Why didn't I complete it? 